And so the biggest farce in US politics so far in 2011 (absent of course from the whole debt [ceiling|target] debate, not to mention the ridiculous budget, but those are topics for another day) is about to come to an end. After earlier tonight the Wisconsin Senate used a "procedural move on Wednesday to pass the proposal without the Democrats present" thereby rendering their three week long self-appointed exile to Illinois moot, "the leader of Democrats in the Wisconsin Senate says his caucus will return to the state, but he won't say when." The loophole used by the Republicans is that in lieu of passing the full budget bill, lacking a Democrat vote for a quorum, they instead formed a
special committee to isolate only the collective bargaining portions of
the bill and passed it with just 19 votes. The Seattle Times reports: "the floor session lasted just minutes, and the state Assembly is
scheduled to take up the measure on Thursday morning. That's the last
step before it can go to Walker for his signature. Senate Democratic leader Mark Miller of Monona says Democrats will
"join the people of Wisconsin in taking back their government," but he
refused to say when." In other words, the first attempt at forced austerity in the US is about to be ancted. What happens next will likely not be pretty as it suddenly becomes evident that the whole "cost-cutting" thing that is so popular in Europe is about to really come to the world's most entitled country.

To commemorate ending the Democrats' three week long vacation from , Wisconsin Senate Majority Leader Fitzgerald issued the following statement:

After nearly a month of debate on the budget repair bill, nearly three weeks of childish stunts and delay tactics from the Democrats, the longest public hearing in state history and the longest Assembly debate in state history, the Senate met tonight to pass the non-fiscal items in the Budget Repair Bill. Sen. Fitzgerald released the following statement:

"Before the election, the Democrats promised "adult leadership" in Madison. Then a month and a half into session, the Senate Democrats fled the state instead of doing their job.

"In doing so, they have tarnished the very institution of the Wisconsin state Senate. This is unacceptable.

"This afternoon, following a week and a half of line-by-line negotiation, Sen. Miller sent me a letter that offered three options: 1) keep collective bargaining as is with no changes, 2) take our counter-offer, which would keep collective bargaining as is with no changes, 3) or stop talking altogether.

"With that letter, I realized that we're dealing with someone who is stalling indefinitely, and doesn't have a plan or an intention to return. His idea of compromise is "give me everything I want," and the only negotiating he's doing is through the media.

"Enough is enough." "The people of Wisconsin elected us to do a job. They elected us to stand up to the broken status quo, stop the constant expansion of government, balance the budget, create jobs and improve the economy. The longer the Democrats keep up this childish stunt, the longer the majority can't act on our agenda.

"Tonight, the Senate will be passing the items in the budget repair bill that we can, with the 19 members who actually DO show up and do their jobs. Those items include the long-overdue reform of collective bargaining needed to help local governments absorb these budget cuts, and the 12 percent health care premium and 5 percent pension contribution.

"We have confirmed with the Legislative Fiscal Bureau, the Legislative Council and the Legislative Reference Bureau that every item in tonight's bill follows the letter of the law.

"The people of Wisconsin elected us to come to Madison and do a job. Just because the Senate Democrats won't do theirs, doesn't mean we won't do ours."

And for those inclined to read what laws actually pass in this country, below is the Legislative Fiscal Bureau's summary of the passed bill, while the actual 138 page bill can be found here.

There’s always the cry for raised taxes to keep necessary services intact in the public sector.

No greater example can be found than a phrase found in the lawsuit against Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s temporary few days' furlough policy for California public employees (SEIU) to help with the budget crisis.The 2010 complaint laments “the governor’s unreasonable insistence to avoidtaxincreases to paythe judgment and to keep the state services intact.”

San Francisco Chronicle columnist Debra J. Saunders this week writes: “Apparently the ticket to economic equality is for Americans to ignore the heavy load of debt that taxpayers much shoulder because politicians have handed out benefits and pensions to public workers regardless of the cost…

“The new message: A government can’t really be broke because politicians have the power to raise taxes.”

The private sector model for salary and benefits is for the employer to define the position in terms of the available salaries and benefits and the applicant has the option of accepting the conditions or not and can, if he wishes, apply for a job elsewhere. It’s unusual in a real world that public employees define the working hours, the job conditions and qualifications, the salary and benefits and if not acceptable to the employer, they then go to binding arbitration to overrule the employer, i.e., the taxpayers.

you know he did; 9-11 and the subsequent commission too. but it only took republicans to run democrats out of texas and wisconsin. why is it that they think this makes good political theater, running from a battle? this is getting to be a habit: impeachment off the table, bush foreign, financial, military policies adopted (after much fulminating about them under bush). it takes at least two functioning parties to have much of a party based democracy. imo the real battles of the next few years will be fought internally in the republican party. the dems are done.

No one is suggesting that public sector unions are the only or the largest cause of the nation's problems. It is a major, if not the largest, cause of the state governments' budget problems. But regardless of magnitude, it is a problem that needs to be solved.

And don't scream at me about bankers, I'm fully aware of the financial oligarchy which controls this nation. That is another problem, let's solve that one too.

+1 We had better start attacking our fiscal issues on multiple levels, although I echo JW's call to go after bankers, MERS, fraudulent mortgage securitization etc as soon as possible. The reining in of government and it's bloodsucking public unions is an important part of the puzzle.

The overall problem is more complex than just a picking "bankster" scapegoat. (while it is part of the overall problem, it is just a facet).

Another facet is in the process of being unwound...loss of taxpayer sovereignty leading to excessive borrowing and sovereign budget problems brought about civil workforce exercise of monopoly privileges.

"The private sector model for salary and benefits is for the employer to define the position in terms of the available salaries and benefits and the applicant has the option of accepting the conditions or not and can, if he wishes, apply for a job elsewhere. It’s unusual in a real world that public employees define the working hours, the job conditions and qualifications, the salary and benefits and if not acceptable to the employer, they then go to binding arbitration to overrule the employer, i.e., the taxpayers"

Exactly. These 'unions' are not free associations, they are government-sponsored entities with special legal privilages, not unlike Medieval guilds. In a free market system, people could organize themselves as they please through free association, cooperate in striking to achieve better conditions, etc. They would NOT be able to force their counterparts to accept contracts against their will. Employment is a contract, like any other, and a contract is invalid unless both parties agree to its terms voluntarily and without having been coerced.

I am saying that JP Morgans Bonus Checks could float your entire state for years, including the Unions monies.

You think the Union is expensive? really? are you sure thats the Problem? I know you dumb fucks in Wisconsin marry your sister and stuff.. but it really is simple math that I am asking you to do, even a genetic defect can add and subtract.. or so I would hope!

JW, JW, you can't explain anything to these morons. They all think if they break up the unions that their taxes are going to go down. Go figure. They think that because Beck and Rush told them so. Bwahahahah

You are being illogical. Essentially you are arguing that they cannot solve one problem while another separate problem exists. This is false. Furthermore this is a state issue, involving state workers, being dealt with by a state government. The Bankster problem is a separate national issue. Yes it must be dealt with but the two problems must be resolved separately. Wisconsin is dealing with the one they can handle on their own. Your criticism is childish and unwarranted.

REAL Austeritybegins when the self-righteous "decision makers" cut their own pay, benefits and perks. At that point we may see some improvement in this country. However, don't count on the hypocrites, of which the Rethuglicans are the biggest, to impose such austerity on themselves. As usual, it's only for those other people.

Going out on a limb here, but a woman's preference for a vibrator versus other mechanical means of masturbating, has everything to do with the fact that she's anatomically female. Her "sexual orientation" does not change the nature of her junk, and therefore doesn't change what mechanical means might best stimulate it.

Yours is an argument for improving the wages of those working in the private sector, not assaulting those in the public sector. The fact that 6% of the private sector is unionized goes a long way to explaining why they've gotten fucked over so badly. It's not the fault of those who are in unions that those who aren't get fucked over by Capitalists, whose profit margins continue to soar year after year. Hell, those in unions are getting fucked, too.

But there's no tax on derivatives. Whew!

IT'S THE CAPITALISTS FAULT! Why let these rat-bastards - the absolute scum of the universe - divide and conquer the 99.9% of the population they're robbing daily. Why should the people who do the work get fucked over more and more egregiously, while the banker-gangsters loot the whole population blind?

Actually, this brings the people together. The 12% of government workers who made twice as much are now going to be more even with the other 88% of non government workers, so we are more equal to each other financially. We should get together and go after the Federal Reserve Corporation who caused this mess.

By, for example, calling anyone who opposes public sector unions a shill for the banks? ...An obvious non sequitur that divides everyone into imaginry right and left? It's alright, I'll just assume you're stupid rather than malevolent.

Yes, taxpayers should have no say in how the massive amount of money that's taken from them is spent. Only a Wall Street lackey would think otherwise. Decent folks say that we should give the unions what they want and tell the people to suck it up like their supposed to do.

downwiththebanks - Just because some of us see a problem with PUBLIC sector unions, doesn't mean that we don't understand that crooks on Wall St have looted the nation leaving us to fight over the scraps.

Whoa now! Slow down Sally. Rothbard understood one needs actual capitalto have captialism. Federal Reserve Corporation Debt Notes are the antithesis of capital. The monopoly (legal tender) on currency issuance and (centralized) control this cartel presently enjoys is also incompatible with capitalism. The American economy is much more casinoism than capitalism. Some of us just cash out our chips (FRN$) for.... something else (precious metals FTMFW!).

The government - such as it is - carries out of the orders given by the Capitalists who own it.

Capitalists don't own the government.

Fascists do. That's the economic system of fascism - it's when corporations own the government. They aren't capitalists anymore - they don't compete on an even playing field. They are fascists now, because they can't compete one on one, they get the Federal government to pass regulations to protect them from competition, to give them money to help them when they screw up so that the competition that didn't screw up doesn't take over their market share.

They aren't capitalists.

Understand the difference. Capitalists will never control the government, but it's the fault of people like you that has allowed this government to go fascist. You gave it too much power.

Take away the power of the government to regulate and bail out private corporations, and there won't be any point for companies to control the government, because all the FEDERAL government will be able to do then is protect the nation, enforce the constitution, and aribtrate disputes between the states. They won't be able to bail out GM or Goldman Sachs, and they won't be able to keep a natural gas powered cars off the road, like they do now.

You think regulations are there to protect you, they are there to protect corporations and if it has the side effect of protecting you, well, that's just an accident.

Capitalists are people who use Capital already stolen to create more Capital from more theft.

No.

Capitalists make more capital by providing value by producing goods and services that people voluntarily buy. This requires innovation by corporations to stay ahead technologically or service wise to keep customers happy and paying customers because goods and services are all voluntarily paid for.

In socialism, the government is expected to produce services that people are forced to buy. In a good socialist system, the citizens will have enough intelligence and power to correctly select a government which will provide goods and services. This requires a well informed population. It can work, as long as you have a very democratic system of government and an intelligent population and a government that can be changed easily. If you can't easily change the government, essential services, like providing food, might break down and people starve.

In Fascism, corporations provide goods and services, but they are controlling the government well enough in order to prevent competition from threatening their profitability. In Fascism you end up with stagnation instead of innovation due to a lack of competition.

We are clearly, and I mean clearly, in fascism. If you don't recognize the problem, you have no chance of fixing it. This is how banks were bailed out and why, it's the system of fascism. Nobody would have voluntarily given the banks money for their crappy CDOs, only the government would. Nobody would save GM, except the government. There are better car companies, ever heard of the Aptera? Probably not, but it's the most efficient car on the planet. We really are fascists.

When that $40,000/year worker is a teacher and students in the U.S. are virtually last in the world in math and science, your right it doesnt take bravery just fucking anger. The public sector unions have the public held hostage. If the D.C. kids want out they cant even get a voucher to get out anymore, because of the unions. And lets get real, teachers make quite a bit more than 40k. If they want my sympathy, they should do their fucking job.

The only reason Wall Street was able to steal trillions of dollars from tax payers, and the only reason the Goldman Sachs still exists today - is because of the government. It was the government that only gives you an option of a 401K that is managed by some shithead, instead of the ability to manage the money yourself. It was the government that bailed out all these banks run by shitheads. It's the government that is underfunded pensions. It's the government that causes inflation and destroys the value of your money. It's the government that doesn't prosecute obvious criminals in our financial sector.

Wallstreet might be corrupt, but they wouldn't be, if they were just allowed to GO BANKRUPT - but the government stepped in and saved them.

Who is the real criminal here? Could it be the entity that is at war with Iraq over weapons of mass destruction that don't exist, and who claims that inflation doesn't exist, and is telling us that they believe in a stong dollar policy??

Can you say cart before the horse. Which came first the briber or the bribed? With out the financial elite to pay the bills and the morons who suck up the propaganda it would be a different bunch in the government.

Can you say cart before the horse. Which came first the briber or the bribed?

I'd say they showed up at the same exact time.

With out the financial elite to pay the bills and the morons who suck up the propaganda it would be a different bunch in the government.

Look, there are always going to be morons. There are always going to be propaganda, that's Public Relations here, Edward Bernays invented that. There are always going to be crooked politicians, and there are always going to be bribes.

But you can avoid the pitfalls of all that, if you just cut the government back to it's constitutional mandate. The Federal government is only supposed to be protecting the nation, arbitrating disputes between states, and enforcing the constitution - that's it.

The Federal government has no right to create a central bank - they coin money, but that's it. The Federal government can't enforce drug laws, but your state and local government can (they can pay for the prisons and incarceration of offenders too). The government can't bail out corporations, and it can't go to war without congressional approval.

The problem is, about 1 out of 10,000 people have read the Constitution, and even less people believe in it. Our Federal government has gone WAY beyond their constitutional mandate. FAR FAR beyond it, and that's the real problem.

Which you will never address, and don't want to fix.

Anything the Federal government does now, the state governments can do as well. Don't like your state government? Vote differently, can't change it? There will be 50 different state systems to chose from.

This battle against overpaid underworked so called public "servants" is one of many that will be fought.

The fascist government that encourages & abets Wall Street crimes is the same government that encourages the theft of taxpayer money to pay usurious rates to it's most fervent supporters, it's own employees.

Here in BizarroLand, we pay teachers a lot of moola, because they do such a good job! In fact, the Govt is thinking about nationalizing whatever it is YOU do for a living next, being so efficient & benevolent and all! </sarc>

"Poor test scores have to do with the family and the society, not with the teachers."

Let's take this at face value as being true, just for arguments sake.

Then we would also have to admit that families (and thereby all of society) has gone through the puppy mill of public education to become what they are now as you say...that is, it had no positive effect.

So, what you're actually saying is we could save 60k per year (plus benefits) by stopping the madness? ;-)

Hello there ironhead you nazi bastard. The about us section on that pos website you advertise.

About

Guerillatics is a conservative blog. If you are: on welfare, unemployment, sucking off the teat of government in anyway, a socialist, a democrat or republican, male or female this blog is here to inform you that you are entitled to nothing and that need is not a claim.

When people talk of teachers, they never discusss what they would do to earn the same compensation package working 9 months a year. Teachers, based upon their value in alternate positions are over-compensated. Run the same test on a fireman - what would a fireman do to earn a 90% pension + bennies in 30 years and earn $100,000 to $150,00-0 for working 10 shifts a months... Is that so hard to grasp?

and yeah I know, teachers are herso, firemen are heros idjist cops are heros, HSA fingerbangers are hero...bleech.

Can't we just all get together, join hands, Tea Partiers and Democrats, and go after the ones responsible for causing all this mess? The "Federal Reserve Corporation", who from the beginning, caused us to lose our homes, jobs, and made all our lives miserable? Lets do that starting now.

You see, the dreams of the welfare stater, the military adventurer, and the leviathan state cog are all completely dependent upon the fiscal fictions that only a strong central bank (like the Fed) can write.

Just yesterday Zero Hedge had an article about the explosion in folks dependent on the government for sustinance... it was 1/3rd of all wages, if memory serves. Do you seriously think such a burden can be met through taxes and loans in a hard currency regime? Seriously?

It takes taxes... lots of taxes. And it takes loans... more than the citizenry will lend willingly (loans that must be inflated away by a manipulative central bank). And sometimes even full-on money printing when times get tough. It takes a synthetic, fictional economy to even pretend such a load can be sustained... an economy like the US, the EU, the Japanese, and even the Chinese have today.

So no, we cannot all join hands and sing Kumbaya as we attack the beast... 'cause a bunch of us serve the beast, need the beast and the things only the beast can provide.

Government workers will defend the system because the need the system. They cannot replace the salary and benefits with which the system bribes them. No FED equals no more privilege for them. They, in their numbers and comfort, instantly becomes an unaffordable luxury in any reality-based economy.

Ripping the curtain back reveals the ponzi for what it is...it's an ugly thing when a congress critter says all I can promise you is debt & misery for what I'm about to do to you...so I invented the Fed instead, for myself and you!...skittles & unicorns for all...LOL.

What sort of logic is it that says that you can't deal with one parasite unless you deal with all of them. Guess what? You can't deal with all of them at once.

A small portion of folks in Wisconsin use the power of the state to force the average worker to compensate them better than he, himself, is compensated and some people act like it's some glorious thing.

So, you advocate picking the low hanging fruit. Save the banking and political classes for last because they take a bit more work. I think, and this is a shot in the dark, the wrong class of folks was picked on. I ain't got no dog in this fight, but these union folks will start burning stuff down. If that's what we want (gotta start a revolution somewhere) then that's what we're gonna get.

You've picked the two extremes, the tails if you will. What we have recently is near the middle of the range. The conflict, we'll call it so, will expand from this center in Wisconsin to the extremes in short order. If we have anything to thank the unionized folks for, it's starting the fire that will become an inferno soon enough. We can't have the omelette of our desires, that of bringing down the oligarchy, without breaking the eggs of a bunch of working folk.

The conservative think tank said the average annual compensation for a Milwaukee Public Schools teacher would exceed $100,000 in 2011. As of July 1, 2011, according to the school district, that figure will be $101,091.

Once again, downwiththebanks: Why is it impossible to oppose various forms of corruption at the same time? Must we choose one at a time to oppose? By demanding that a particular type of corruption is the only one that should be considered, and by attacking those who oppose other sorts of corruption, you're losing a lot of potential allies.

This events in Wisconsin of the past three weeks have absolutely nothing to do with the great austerity battle to come. Anyone who tries to keep spinning the story in some way about greedy unions, etc. has been spending too much time watching Fox News.

The unions caved in 3 weeks ago on the proposal to contribute a much greater portion of their pension and health insurance costs. The problem is that Walker wanted the measure to end collective bargaining passed as well. This fight has been because he wasn't satisifed getting 99% of what he proposed - he wanted 100%.

Bullshit, this was a procedural shafting by a legislative majority like Obamacare was, the main difference being that the majority of WI residents supported curbing union power, hereas a great majority of Americans disapproved of the Pelosi/Obamacare bill as it was passed, on a holiday weekend as I recall.

Welcome back to planet earth union members. The economy blows, and there isn't enough money to overpay you anymore. Feel free to make up the difference in your salary by shorting the market when QE2 runs out and the S&P follows you back to terra firma.

So I'm a killer if I don't pay Special Ed teachers because I don't need Special Education? Please tell me how much are you willing to pay me for services which I won't actually provide to you? I'm sure that you'll be sending me a substantial check soon because you are a righteous man and not a hypocrite in the least.

Look, we all hate the corporate oligarchy here at ZH. But that does not change the fact that the states are indeed broke, and part of the reason for this fact is the outrageous benefits public employees receive. Further, unions were created to protect labor from capital; in the public sector half of that equation is missing...there is no capital, no profit, therefore, no need for labor unions!

If that's a serious comment, then clearly you don't understand the problem. Taxing Wall Street would do nothing but send more of the proceeds of the banks criminal activities to the federal government, which they own. The solution is to eliminate collusion between the banks and the government and so prevent that criminal activity in the first place. The problem lies not with the free market, but with government intrusion in the free market. The criminal activities of the banks would NOT be possible absent that government intervention in the economy.

Do you live in Wisconsin Nathan? I bet you don't. Do you know for example that police and firefighters are exempt from the bill? Their pension contribution and health care benefits are not being cut. Coincidentally both their unions supported Walker.

Just so we're clear, we are talking about public employees in Wisconsin. This isn't coal miners at Maetwan striking for living wages or safe working conditions. The whole idea of a public employee union is ludicrous to begin with -- why should people be allowed to unionize against the rest of the population?

I'm no fan of bankers, but there is no way to tax Wall Street to pay them. The union wants Wisconsin taxpayers (many of them who are unemployed, and almost all of whom have taken a hit to income recently) to foot the bill for their excessive pay. That is unfair, regardless of what you think of JPM or GS.

If you're wondering how I know they are overpayed, compare their income to teachers at private schools.

you're a jackass.. those private school teachers are WAY overpayed compared to China's teachers. Why should investors of private schools pay these high rates that you believe in?

In fact, the owners of those private schools should piss all revenue away into fake off-shore bullshit companies to show they are not making enough to pay ANYTHING for these thug private school teachers... the book doesn't lie!! There is no money !! (um, not here at least.. don't question our book)

It's the same people doing the same job in the same place. Public school teachers are paid more because they leach off the state, pouring money into election campaigns for their own gain. Private school teachers suffer with market wages for their services.

I'm not going to shed any tears over people who leech excess money off of taxpayers when they have to face the same reality as everyone else for once.

Have you ever looked at the tax portion of your check? You do understand that that money that gets taken out is the same money that isn't buy your students new shoes, isn't buying new backpacks, and isn't buying new school supplies, right? People everywhere are sick of being taxed to death. If you did the math you would notice that even if you took all of the money from that everyone in finance makes you still wouldn't be able to pay our "poor" teachers the outrageous sum of money that they demand for working 9 months out of the year.

People are also sick of seeing their children come home from school and finding out that the biggest thing that they learned today is what the name of section 3 is in the standardized test. If I am going to pay someone that much money to teach my children, they had better teach. Instead we get whinning about not new enough books (why do we need books, you got a degree, you have a printer, right? MAKE YOUR OWN!), not new enough facilities (I went to the same school that my parents did, and I turned out almost normal - FAIL), and not enough computers (Pencil and paper not good enough anymore?).

We, the people who pay your salary through taxes, have looked at the job that you do and have decided that you are overpaid. If you think that you should be making more money, then get a different job.

clearly you haven't the slightest fucking clue how much money is made in finance or else you wouldn't hemorrage stupid from your mouth as if it were your sole source of income and you were being paid based on demonstrable ignorance.

Yes, there is also graft on wall street, but that will also disappear. I just don't see much of a reason to fund one persons illicit gain with anothers. I would rather just do away with both of them that make their livelihood out of my blood, sweat, and tears.